


the snow had fallen early

by NewWonder



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Dubious Consent, Iwan Rheon being beautiful, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Stockholm Syndrome, Violence, minor gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-20
Updated: 2013-04-20
Packaged: 2017-12-08 23:52:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/767549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NewWonder/pseuds/NewWonder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That must have been the kindest deed anyone had ever done for him.</p><p>(Or, a fic entirely influenced by the fact that Iwan Rheon can sing.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	the snow had fallen early

**Author's Note:**

> So, apparently Iwan Rheon sings like an angel. This beautiful fact wouldn't leave my head, so I needed to get it out of my system somehow.
> 
> This is a mash-up of the books and the show, set further along the TV storyline. Warning: big spoilers ahead, Ramsay being Ramsay. Nothing too graphic, but, you know... Ramsay.

Lord Ramsay is in a good mood tonight. He lays off his knife and sings, just for the two of them to hear.

Theon clutches close to his chest his hand, mercifully relieved of another festering, enflamed finger, and listens.

Ramsay Snow – no, Bolton, should not forget that, must never forget – is as good as any bard Theon has ever heard; maybe even better then some. A silken voice, a silken touch, a scabrous song and a smiling face, and Theon shivers.

He has never before met a man or a woman whose touch and voice could cut as viciously as a good knife. To think he had welcomed that touch, at first; a rock to lean on, a steady hand to hold on to. To think he had longed to hear that voice, when he was left all alone and cold and naked in the dark, stripped and vulnerable the way he had never been before. He could have kissed those hands when they untied him.

He did kiss them, later.

Lord Ramsay breaks off the song.

But it’s not over, it’s not over, Theon chants wordlessly, frantically. The maid has yet to dance with the bear. It’s not over, there’s a whole story to sing yet.

But Lord Ramsay’s gotten bored; and he is coming for his pet.

He draws out his knife, studies the blade, bright and flashing – he made Theon sharpen it, once. It was cold and slipped out of weak shaking hands, and Theon cut himself on it. Ramsay laughed before licking off the droplets. Maybe he had liked the taste; in a minute, he had Theon’s skin opened to try some more. His lips got crimson with Theon’s blood, and he was well amused by the end of it.

Theon made him _smile_. That’s why he loved his Reek, Lord Ramsay said; his best-trained bitch, his favourite pet. Do you love me too, Reek, he would ask, chuckling softly.

And he would answer; he would say the truth.

Of course, he’d say, of course I do.

How could Reek not love his master, kind and merciful and just.

Lord Ramsay’s not in a hurry. He puts away the knife, he motions for Theon to come closer. Theon crawls, obedient, the fresh stump of his finger leaving bloody stripes on the newly washed sheets. His master is just in his breeches and a thin shirt, unlaced at the throat. How easy it could have been to stick hard iron into that pale exposed flesh. Then Lord Ramsay would thrash, and cough up blood, and then he would die; and then Theon would never have to lose another finger again.

He crawls, bows his head. He sees the legs first, and the dark cloth of Ramsay’s breeches. He crawls between them, nosing at the collarbone, licking his master’s cheek. His spit is still pinkish from that tooth he lost earlier this day, Theon remembers. Ramsay idly raises a hand to pet his dirty, tangled hair, and Th… Reek laps at the palm with his tongue, wet and enthusiastic. What a good pet he is; master will see, and be pleased, and not punish him – much.

Theon nests himself on the broad chest, and Lord Ramsay’s arms fall around him, idly worrying at the bruises and cuts he still carries from yesterday and the day before. Theon cannot hold in a small moan of hurt, and Ramsay rewards him with a kiss to the top of his head for that.

"Your smell is getting worse, my Reek," he murmurs softly. "Would you like to get rid of it – a nice hot bath, perhaps?"

"No, my lord," Theon barely suppresses his shiver, "it’s fine, I’m fine."

He did say yes, once. He was ready to _beg_ for a tub of hot water; his hair was matted and greasy, and his skin had been covered with red rash from all the dirt and dung that soiled it. Ramsay smiled, then, and Theon shivered, but he was still too headstrong to trust his own instincts. He didn’t crawl to him begging to let him stay dirty. He wanted his bath.

Ramsay did get him a pail of water. It was scalding hot, and he poured it over Theon’s head like uncle Aeron did back at Pyke. He was baptized that way when he came back home to the Iron Islands, Theon remembers; only back then, the water was bitter-salty and freezing cold, and now it burned him down to the bone and made him shriek like a pig.

"Bad Reek," Ramsay said, tossed the pail away – it smashed against the wall with a clank – and took him by the chin, staring into his eyes. His gaze burned, too; it was vicious and utterly enraged. "Forgetting your place, aren’t you? Forgetting who you are, forgetting _your name_. Why don’t I teach you a lesson, then?"

And he took Theon’s toe for his pail of hot water, skinned it and let it rot, and made Theon wail for days before relieving him of his pain. When the knife finally cut through flesh and bone in a swift, sure move, Reek thought, tears slowly rolling down his cheeks from his blearing eyes, that it must have been the kindest deed anyone had ever done for him.

Since that day, Theon has well learned to bear his uncleanliness. Dirty, stinky, it made no difference for Lord Ramsay; or rather, he loved his Reek all the more for it.

Reek shyly snuggles into his master’s chest. The knife is glistening sharply, ever at Ramsay’s hand, but the cold bites nearly as harshly. And Theon is always cold these days; he has grown so much thinner than before, and he is shivering all the time, his thin filthy rags a flimsy cover from the frost. The summer is over.

But Ramsay is warm, and smells faintly like wine and dogs. He draws his Reek closer and nips the tip of his ear with sharp white teeth, his hand straying down to unlace his breeches. He will want Reek to service him, soon. Reek is ready, ever so ready; Reek is willing, Reek is eager, pleasing his master is all Reek ever wants.

* * *

"Does my touch pleasure you?" Ramsay asks, later, carding his fingers through Theon’s hair where the dark strands are powdered with white as if the snow had fallen early on them, lulling him to sleep; so softly, so gently. The faint light of the fireplace is flickering, not enough to see clearly, and it is slowly getting cold.

"Aye, my lord," he responds, and once again he is speaking the truth. Theon has long since learned: _the greatest pleasure is the absence of pain_.

"Have I told you about the Reek I had before you?" he asks. Theon shakes his head. He’s heard things, here and there, he doesn’t want to listen, doesn’t want to hear of the one who was before him. The knife draws gentle circles on his lower belly, but Theon had long stopped being afraid it might sink all the way in.

Ramsay would never harm him like that, so much that he would stop breathing and hurting and being amusing. Reek was Ramsay’s, and Ramsay ever took good care of his property.

And Ramsay was Reek’s, he said so himself, he promised. He whispered that in the dark, carving Theon’s skin off his pinky finger, and Theon believed him.

Lord Ramsay smiles – Reek feels it in the way his throat moves, – and wordlessly hums the last notes of the song, and off they go, the bear and the maiden fair; and the last coals of the fire crackle feebly and die out.


End file.
